Ewing and Robinson take turns in man-to-man defense, while Jordan, Pippen, Mu Lin, and others continuously harass.
Gan Guoyang’s offensive success rate is quite high, with a shooting rate of sixty percent under the basket.
However, the Dream Team’s offensive success rate is even higher. After the timeout, they scored in all ten consecutive offensive rounds!
Even if Gan Guoyang had four hands, he wouldn’t be able to manage everything on the court.
Without the help of Sabonis, Kossie, and Lewis, he can only control his defensive coverage within a smaller range.
Meanwhile, Stockton is very logical and smart in deploying defense, constantly making the best passing choices to give his teammates easier offensive opportunities.
The Dream Team players are already significantly more skilled than other players from China. Whenever there’s a one-on-one opportunity, they surely score.
Even if China Team insists on zone defense, without Gan Guoyang assisting at the back, many times two people can’t hold down one.
Jordan catches the ball at the top of the arc, speeds up to break through the constraints of the zone defense, and goes straight to the basket center, forcing Gan Guoyang to come over and assist.
Jordan switches hands in mid-air, passing the ball behind Gan Guoyang to David Robinson, who catches it and dunks it with both hands!
Such a play is just impossible to stop; the outside defense is easily torn apart, and Gan Guo needs three heads and six arms to turn around to block Robinson’s dunk.
The score gap gradually widens from two points, with the Dream Team using their extremely high offensive efficiency to bring the score to 42:30, leading China Team by 12 points with two minutes left in the half.
A score of 42 is already low enough for the Dream Team. Although China Team can’t stop Team USA’s offense in positional play, they managed to slow down the offensive pace.
In previous matches, the Dream Team could average as many as 120 points per game in FIBA’s 40-minute matches, which is an extremely terrifying score.
It’s important to know that in the NBA, with 48 minutes per game and no zone defense allowed, the Nuggets, a team focused on offense with no defense, only averages 110 points.
The Dream Team’s high score comes not from throwing three-pointers wildly, but from endless fast break counterattacks.
Their defense is too strong, leaving the opponents prone to turnovers, followed by Team USA’s constant wave-like counterattacks.
In a match, possibly over half of their points come from fast breaks, making it hard for the score not to be high.
But China Team successfully controlled their turnovers because their offense is very simple, just passing the ball to Gan Guoyang.
In fact, most of the time, others don’t handle the ball; Gan Guoyang personally dribbles over half court to organize the offense.
If there isn’t a good opportunity on the court, he doesn’t attack randomly, holding the ball and delaying until the 24-second shot clock forces a shot.
Because his forced shots have a higher success rate than passing to others, it also minimizes turnovers.
Once the offense misses, they immediately retreat to defense, giving Team USA no chance to counterattack, which is why Team USA scored only 42 points.
During the timeout, Jiang Xingquan asked Gan Guoyang if he needed a break.
Gan Guoyang shook his head without saying anything.
He is currently running on his own track.
Although teammates are also running, they can only watch him from afar, completely unable to keep up.
Even though the Dream Team is leading in points, they are similarly falling behind.
At the end of the first half, the score is 46:34, with China Team trailing by 12 points.
Gan Guoyang scored 22 points, grabbed 8 rebounds, made 2 blocks, and had 3 assists in the first half.
Besides Gan Guoyang, other players from China Team scored only 12 points, which is already a pretty good performance.
Gan Guoyang played the entire first half; he was not perfect in shooting and made some mistakes under high-intensity surround.
But overall, his performance was perfect, and the strategy he devised was perfect as well; China Team did their best.
During the halftime in the locker room, Gan Guoyang re-emphasized the strategy and required everyone to persist till the end.
"Even at the last moment, we must give it our all, or the match would end prematurely."
"Playing in such an interesting match, every extra minute is a reward."
On the other side, in the Dream Team’s locker room, there’s no trace of the arrogance from before the Olympics began, where they said, "I want to thrash Ah Gan."
Ah Gan can never be underestimated and always deserves to be taken seriously; this guy is the best basketball player.
Jordan sat quietly in front of the locker, recalling Gan Guoyang’s first-half performance, wondering if he could do better than Ah Gan himself?
No, it’s completely impossible.
With such teammates, Jordan feels he would go mad first.
That balding player dribbling around has no offensive ability, just keeps twisting around.
The two thin players on the perimeter, one runs and jumps well but has poor dribbling skills, while the other hunch is too slow.
Inside players are either short or slow; none are even qualified as the 12th man in an NBA team; their level is below college players.
Their centers and forwards seemingly have some physique, but in confrontations, they are weak; Jordan thinks he could play center without any problem.
These people, in terms of physical fitness, might be worse than African refugees from Angola; truly not sure what they were training for back in Portland.
Yet, after the first half, China Team has been the closest to a competition Team USA has had so far; finally, everyone is no longer playing around but actually competing.
Beelman called for the first timeout since the Olympics began, Stockton began to organize seriously, Jordan acted like a team guard making optimal choices, and Bird leaned on the sideline constantly strategizing.